I Won’t Let the Execution Battalion Die, ~Even If the Empire Falls, We Want to Survive~ - Chapter 79: Even if the Empire Collapses, We Want to Survive

When we went outside, it had become completely dark, and street lamps illuminated the stone pavement. Of course they weren’t electric lights, but oil lamps. Neighborhood associations and guilds hired people to maintain them.

“What should we do, ‘Doctor’?”

When Second Lieutenant Crimine in nurse attire asked, I continued walking while confirming the situation:

“The best plan would be to bypass the palace and head for the western gate.”

“But you won’t take the best plan, will you?”

This woman understood me well.

I turned up my coat collar and nodded slightly:

“Before leaving the capital, I want to confirm the palace situation one last time. How the Imperial Household ends will change our subsequent actions.”

According to Captain Yugi, the Emperor had escaped through secret passages, but then who was commanding at the palace? What would happen to the palace guards?

And how did the ‘nightingales’ intend to use the crowd besieging the palace?

All were important information for considering our future fugitive life.

“I especially want to know how the ‘nightingales’ view the people and pro-imperial faction. Yuo shouldn’t do anything too reckless, but it would be problematic if she’d lost real power or if extremists were running wild.”

“You still trust her as always.”

Second Lieutenant Crimine sounded displeased. She sulked easily.

I put my arm around her shoulder:

“The one I trust most is you, Riesha.”

“Geez.”

Second Lieutenant Crimine made a sulking sound, but seemed to have recovered her mood. I could tell from her tone.

“You really do love doing dangerous things.”

“So do you.”

I started walking through the nighttime capital carrying my house call bag:

“Yuo is the people’s goddess. She’s unified their will, won over the wealthy and nobles too, and now she’s trying to overthrow the Emperor. But precisely because she’s the people’s goddess, there’s danger that she’s overlooking the people’s true nature.”

“What is the people’s true nature?”

To Second Lieutenant Crimine asking from behind, I considered how to answer.

But before I could voice it, bird calls echoed across the twilight sky.

“What could that be?”

“It sounds like nightingales, but something’s strange about it.”

Second Lieutenant Crimine looked anxious.

I also immediately noticed the odd quality of the calls:

“Real nightingales make more complex calls. This is too monotonous—probably bird whistles.”

“Ah, I know those. The ones that imitate mating calls to lure prey, right? For hunting.”

“That’s right.”

But of course, no one would start bird hunting in a place like this.

“Probably some kind of signal. Something bad is likely to happen.”

“Something bad…”

Second Lieutenant Crimine’s question was quickly resolved.

Because we heard gunshots from the palace direction.

“We’ve been shot! The palace guards are shooting at us!”

“Those bastards shot at us unarmed people!”

We could hear people shouting loudly.

“Is it true?”

“Fifty-fifty. The ‘nightingales’ might have fired.”

In this dim light, the shooter couldn’t be identified, and gunshot sounds echoed off buildings, making precise location unclear.

But the fact that someone had fired was certain.

And that fact alone was sufficient to set events in motion.

“Palace guards shot unarmed people!”

“Apparently on the Emperor’s orders!”

“Damn it, what bullshit!”

“I’ve had enough! Shoot back!”

Angry voices came from all directions, and men with hand axes and carrying poles burst from doorways.

“Kill them!”

“What kind of Emperor acts so high and mighty!”

“Get them!”

In an instant the streets overflowed with people running toward the palace.

While watching them go from the shadows, Second Lieutenant Crimine said quietly:

“Wow… But why so suddenly?”

“Until now, following the law meant you wouldn’t be killed. But because the Emperor encouraged denunciations, citizens being executed became a daily routine, right?”

Actually, the Ceremonial Battalion had taken meticulous care to ensure no one was executed based on denunciations, but outsiders had no way of knowing that.

“If you’ll be killed even when staying quiet, might as well get them first.”

“I see.”

If capital residents had rioted before, the Imperial Guards Division or nearby divisions would have quickly suppressed them.

But now there was no power to suppress riots.

I urged Second Lieutenant Crimine:

“Please act like you’re participating in the riot as much as possible.”

“Understood. But why?”

While watching the shouting people, I answered quietly:

“It’s dangerous if they think we’re enemies.”

“Roger.”

The capital’s palace was surrounded by vast gardens and iron fencing, with stone-paved boulevards and plazas spreading around that.

The boulevards were lined with prestigious shops serving the court and government offices.

When we reached the palace front by getting caught up in the flow of people, fierce combat was already occurring.

“You bastards! What outrageous disrespect at His Majesty’s very feet!”

“The Emperor’s dogs are saying something!”

“Kill them all! Payback for daily grievances!”

The palace guards in white uniforms stood out even in the darkness. Muskets took over twenty seconds to reload, but of course no rioters would wait for that.

They tore up broken stone pavement for throwing and attacked swinging knives and clubs.

“Die! Die!”

A gentle-looking white-haired old man was beating a young palace guard about his grandson’s age. The poor guard was already dead, but his ordeal wasn’t over yet.

“Kill all those who support the Emperor!!”

“There’s one over there!”

Such voices came from nearby and Second Lieutenant Crimine showed a frightened expression, but the man captured was a complete stranger.

“This guy delivered meat to the palace! He’s part of the pro-imperial faction!”

“No, that’s different! That was business! I’m part of the anti-imperial faction too!”

“We won’t be fooled! Die!”

Someone swung down a hammer without question.

“Gyaaah! St-stop! You’re wrong!”

“Kill anyone who took money from the palace!”

That would mean killing all soldiers.

I wanted to help the poor butcher, but when I tried to rush over, Second Lieutenant Crimine grabbed my arm.

“You can’t, ‘Doctor’!”

“Let me go—as a physician I can’t overlook this.”

While maintaining our roleplay as doctor and nurse, Second Lieutenant Crimine clung to me with extraordinary intensity:

“Absolutely not. You understand, right?”

Rescuing the butcher in this situation would be suicide. Not only might we just end up with two corpses, but it could amplify the rioters’ paranoia.

While I argued with Second Lieutenant Crimine, the butcher was killed.

“Once he’s dead, he’s just like meat.”

“Let’s keep killing traitors like this. Attack all the shops in that area.”

While watching the killers, now possessed by bloodlust, begin looting nearby stores, Second Lieutenant Crimine asked me:

“Is this the people’s true nature?”

“That’s right.”

Some people seemed to sense danger and began moving away from the palace.

We rode that flow away from the palace.

Climbing stairs to a hill overlooking the plaza, we could see looting and arson occurring everywhere.

“Whoa…”

Since Second Lieutenant Crimine was appalled, I explained:

“The people are a group without commanders. Generally when numbers exceed the Dunbar number—about two hundred—leaders become necessary. Infantry companies, the basic combat unit, are sized to stay within this number, but…”

(T/N: Dunbar’s number is a suggested cognitive limit to the number of people with whom one can maintain stable social relationships—relationships in which an individual knows who each person is and how each person relates to every other person)

Street lamps illuminated people here and there in the darkness.

Line infantry begging for their lives, and people beating them to death.

People fighting each other for unclear reasons. People breaking into shops and stealing money and goods indiscriminately.

People laughing and heckling like spectators watching entertainment.

Most of the scene was shrouded in darkness, and I couldn’t see what was happening there. But surely the same things were occurring in the shadows.

“The crowd here has at least ten thousand people by conservative estimate. It’s impossible for that many humans to maintain order without discipline or leaders. So this happens.”

Gunshots rang out from various directions—pop pop. We could hear screams, angry shouts, and sounds of things breaking.

We should leave here quickly, but hearing different sounds from a distance, I took out a small bottle of brandy from inside my coat. A physician’s necessity—smelling salts.

“There’s a story about this.”

“What kind?”

I’m about to tell you. Let me look cool.

“Dogs show their bellies in submission poses. Then no matter how fiercely they were fighting, other dogs stop attacking.”

“I know. We had lots of hunting dogs at home.”

Yeah. I figured…

“It’s wisdom to prevent dogs with sharp fangs from killing each other in packs. Over long, long lives, only such dogs remained. To survive as a pack.”

Since evolution as a concept didn’t exist in this world yet, I had to choose words carefully.

“But doves have no submission poses. When fights break out, they can just fly away. So when confined in places like dovecotes, killing occurs.”

“Really?”

“Really. I learned it in communications lectures.”

Though I’d read it in a previous life book first. It was by an animal behaviorist.

“We humans are like doves—we don’t know how to control violence. Once fighting instincts ignite, they can’t be stopped. Plus we’re social animals, so we influence each other. Peaceful people becoming riotous mobs happens in an instant.”

I took a sip of premium brandy, but couldn’t think it tasted good while viewing such scenery.

“I think we managed fairly well as the Emperor’s dogs.”

“Dogs don’t engage in pointless killing.”

Second Lieutenant Crimine snorted proudly, so I nodded in agreement.

Right. We’d tried to reduce unnecessary bloodshed even a little.

“But what about the doves led by ‘nightingales’?”

“Seems impossible. They’re already killing each other.”

Then a cavalry group came pouring into the plaza. What I’d faintly heard earlier was apparently horse neighing after all.

“Finally the cavalry makes an appearance.”

“Which faction is that?”

“Probably ‘nightingales.’ The palace cavalry regiment was mobilized for ‘prairie fire’ suppression and that was it.”

Yuo had probably anticipated chaos would occur. Like mounted police still used for riot control in modern times, cavalry had strong effects against crowds.

The cavalry tried to scatter the rioters, but since the rioters couldn’t distinguish friend from foe, they even attacked the cavalry. Naturally they were kicked and trampled by warhorses, getting thoroughly beaten up. There were probably deaths too.

Seeing this, Second Lieutenant Crimine commented coldly:

“But rather than suppressing them, they’re just making things more complicated.”

“So it seems.”

Second Lieutenant Crimine turned her back on the scene below:

“These people are hopeless. Let’s go before we get caught up and killed.”

That was certainly wise.

I had no power to resolve this chaos. Even wanting to protect the people being killed in that darkness, I had no power. Rather, I was on the side that would be killed.